Navigation

NBG gets four offers for its NPL portfolio

Four suitors have entered the final stage of the process for the acquisition of the nonperforming loans portfolio under the name “Earth,” which National Bank of Greece has put up for sale.

The package of loans with a nominal value of 5.2 billion euros is being courted by Czech company APS, Norway’s B2Holding, Germany’s EOS and Sweden’s Hoist. The four investment funds have tabled binding offers and according to sources the favorites at the moment are APS and Hoist.

Earth is the biggest NPL portfolio a Greek bank has put up for offer to date. It contains some 300,000 unsecured loans issued to about 200,000 borrowers. The original value of the loans is 1.9 billion euros, while the remaining 3.3 billion concerns accumulated interest.

Its loans include debts from consumer credit, cards and loans issued to very small enterprises (mainly self-employed professionals). The average debt per borrower was 10,000 euros and the average period of delay was seven years.

Sources say National will secure a better price than that achieved by Alpha Bank and Eurobank, whose portfolios were sold at 2.3-2.4 percent of their nominal value.